"But is she?"
He looked at her with his miserable eyes, then turned them from her, considering gravely what she had said. It was then, while Rowcliffe was considering it, that the garden gate opened violently and fell to.
They waited for the sound of the front door bell.
Instead of it they heard two doors open and Ally's voice calling to
Greatorex in the hall.
As the Vicar flung himself from his study into the other room he saw Alice standing close to Greatorex by the shut door. Her lover's arms were round her.
He laid his hands on them as if to tear them apart.
"You shall not touch my daughter—until you've married her."
The young man's right arm threw him off; his left arm remained round
Alice.
"It's yo' s'all nat tooch her, Mr. Cartaret," he said. "Ef yo' coom between her an' mae I s'all 'ave t' kill yo'. I'd think nowt of it. Dawn't yo' bae freetened, my laass," he murmured tenderly.
The next instant he was fierce again.